


Sick Jonny, soft Jonny, little ball of rage

by schrijverr



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Caretaking, Crew as Family, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, Found Family, Gen, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Jonny d'Ville Gets A Hug, Sickfic, Sleepy Cuddles, Soft Jonny d'Ville, all the love is stored in the sick Jonny, and younger sibling energy, emphasis on the comfort, sorry but Jonny has tiny energy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:53:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25767016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schrijverr/pseuds/schrijverr
Summary: Jonny was the youngest when he got mechanized, it’s not really noticable, but he’s sick and looking for comfort the other see how small he is. He finds Tim, Ashes and Marius, who take care of him.
Relationships: Jonny d'Ville & Ashes O'Reilly & Gunpowder Tim & Marius von Raum
Comments: 26
Kudos: 222





	Sick Jonny, soft Jonny, little ball of rage

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me and this fic on my tumblr too, which is also @schrijverr. Hope you pop in and say hi!

Technically Jonny was the oldest. He was the first of the Mechanisms and had been around the longest, so logically he would be the oldest. Still, there was the argument of mental age, which would make the rest of the crew tell you Jonny was a child.

And he was still a child.

Immortality was already wonky in itself and, since they couldn’t age, there was also the question of age based on how old you were when you got mechanized. Then, Jonny would be the youngest.

Time was weird like that.

He had been only 17 when Dr. Carmilla found him, already chewed up by a town on a planet that didn’t care about anyone. Nastya came a close second with her 19 years and Jonny saw her as his younger sister, since he had been stuck at 17 for a long while before they’d picked her up, but that didn’t change the fact that he was younger, technically.

Most of the time you didn’t notice it all. He was violent, had seen too much and was much older than the 17 years his body was stuck at, but sometimes the other Mechanisms were hit with just how young Jonny had been when his life became never ending.

Now was one of those times. 

Jonny had been sick for a week now. Killing him hadn’t worked and a very excited Raphaella had taken samples to her lab to figure out what was wrong. It apparently wasn’t a sickness he could give to the other crew members, since it only appeared his species, which was nice. 

Jonny hated being alone.

Not that he’d been able to get out of bed much the past few days. He had been too sleepy and too heavy to move himself and it was either too hot or too cold to do anything other than lying in his bed doing nothing other than coughing or vomiting while wearing only an oversized shirt he had stolen from Brian and some boxers.

But today he had managed.

He had woken up feeling too cold and with his sickness addled mind he had decided that he wanted to hug someone warm. So he had set out to find someone, anyone at this point. He could later blame it on sickness instead of just craving contact and not being alone.

It wasn’t really hard to find anyone. A part of the crew was just lounging around in the common area, no one had been in the mood for killing and fighting without Jonny there, it just wasn’t the same. So when Tim spotted him he exclaimed: “Jonny!”

That caught the attention of the others, who looked at the doorway as well. 

Tim could now also see that Jonny wasn’t better yet, which was disappointing. He also noticed how different Jonny looked, without the usual outfit and drowning in a shirt. He looked smaller. The blanket trailing behind him like a cape didn’t help either and he wasn’t wearing his make up, which also made him look much younger than normal.

Jonny didn’t even have the energy to reply. Instead he stumbled down the few steps and collapsed on the couch in the space between Tim and Ashes. He crawled under his blanket, where he immediately had a coughing fit, which made him curl into himself.

When the coughing subsided Tim carefully asked the figure lying next to him: “Are you okay?”

The lump of blankets grumbled something, sounding displeased, and started shuffling towards Tim until Jonnys head was in Tims lap and he was burrowing his nose into Tims stomach. Tim looked at him with big eyes, unsure of what to do now. His hands twitched, but he didn’t know where to put them, so they just stayed still at his sides.

Tim looked around the room to the others who were there. Ashes gave him a shrug telling him that they were just as confused as him, while Marius was ignoring Tim, too busy looking at Jonny like he was trying to figure out what this all meant.

It was quiet in the common area for a while, then Jonny started to shiver and his teeth started to clatter. He pulled the blanket closer around him and curled up more around Tim. 

When the shivering and clattering didn’t stop, Tim got worried. Despite fighting with Jonny a lot there was a brotherly camaraderie between the two and it worried him to see the other looking so young and vulnerable. 

He swallowed and looked at the others again, they were no help at all, so he asked: “Jonny? What’s wrong?”

“C- col- cold.” Jonny stuttered out.

Tim slowly moved his left hand to Jonnys back, which he rubbed awkwardly, but soothingly. He loosened up a bit when he felt Jonny melt against the touch. After a while Jonny was still shivering slightly and Tim had a bright idea, which he would probably get killed for. He said: “Not that I don’t want you here, Jonny, but I tend to run a bit cool and Ashes runs pretty hot. If you’re still so cold, maybe they can warm you a bit?”

Ashes’ head shot up and they glared at him, while they made a threatening gesture that went over Jonnys head, both literally and figuratively. He blinked a few times and nodded, before struggling to sit upright and turning towards Ashes. 

Ashes had been planning to kill Jonny if he actually thought Tim was right and tried to snuggle up with them, but then they saw Jonnys face. It was free of the usual mania and the bags under his eyes were huge. He yawned, it was a small kitten yawn and they decided they would make fun of him for that when he was feeling better to make up for what they allowed him to do next.

Jonny fell back down, this time to other way around onto Ashes. He had been sitting closer to them and Ashes was slouching, so instead of falling on their lap, like he had done by Tim, he fell on their stomach. He wasn’t deterred by the position and instead curled himself into a ball at their side, creating as much contact between their bodies as he could.

They could feel the tremors wracking through his small frame and they thought back to the smaller kids in the orphanage as well as the newer recruits of Smooth Mickey. So instead of pushing him away they put their arm around him, steadying him.

With the warmth and the hug, he so desperately needed, provided. Jonny allowed himself to relax, his mind too hazy with sickness to feel embarrassed. After a few minutes he felt himself drift away while he went boneless against Ashes.

Ashes could pinpoint the exact moment he fell asleep because of this and, mildly surprised, they stated: “He fell asleep.”

“Really?” Marius asked.

Ashes nodded and lifted their arm to show the slack sleeping face of Jonny against their side. When he felt the arm leave he frowned and wiggled in his sleep, only stopping and giving a small content sigh when Ashes returned the arm to its previous spot.

Marius hummed and murmured: “Curious.” before making a few notes.

Tim seemed to agree as he sat on his knees and strained his neck to get a better look at their sleeping First Mate. After a while of looking he acknowledged what all had noticed: “He looks so young like this, doesn’t he?”

Glad someone else pointed it out first Ashes nodded: “Yeah, it’s crazy how much older he looks when he’s just being his bastard self.”

“I never noticed as well, but it must do a lot with your psyche to become immortal at such a young age.” Marius noted, “I won’t claim I was old when it happened, but I think it’s fair to say I was older than Jonny, you?”

Both nodded, Tim had been a bright eyed twenty-year-old soldier, while Ashes had been 23 and already broken by the world, Marius had just turned 30 when it had happened to him. They all still had a life ahead of them, a life that was now longer than anticipated of course, but they hadn’t been a teen.

Jonnys body had now decided to be too hot again, apparently the small respite of the heat was over and back with a vengeance. He was also very tired, however, so he didn’t wake up fully, not to awareness.

Instead he sleepily fought against Ashes arm until they lifted it. Then he kicked off his blanket, which slid to the floor, and flopped back down onto the couch again in the space between Tim and Ashes.

The three other Mechanisms held their breath as they watched him lie there for a second. His nose twitched and his head tossed from side to side. He frowned and felt around, at first Tim thought he must be looking for his blanket again, so he held it near Jonnys hand, who found it, but he didn’t take the blanket instead tugging on Tims hand. Tim wasn’t prepared for that and toppled over onto Jonny, who smiled in his sleep and used him as teddy bear.

Ashes couldn’t help, but laugh at his startled face and predicament. Tim shot them a glare, but didn’t move. He was unsure how to proceed, since this had never happened before in all the millennia they’d known each other.

Marius had gotten up from the other couch and squatted down next to them until he was at eye level with Jonnys sleeping form. He tapped his chin a few times, before he said: “I think the sickness has lowered his defenses so much that he unconsciously seeks out the contact he usually craves, but pushes down.”

Tim and Ashes raised their brows disbelievingly and Ashes slowly asked: “You’re saying that Jonny, our Jonny, who kills you if you touch him when he isn’t prepared, wants a hug?”

Marius nodded and Tim looked down at Jonny before he replied: “I mean, it does look like he wants a hug.” 

He demonstrated by trying to wiggle free, causing Jonny to frown and whine in his sleep as he tightened his grip on Tims torso and burrowed his face into Tims neck.

Ashes hummed thoughtfully as they thought about that. It did make sense with how Jonny was acting right now and if they thought about it more closely they did recall instances in which they had slung an arm around Jonny, after a particularly good battle with lots of violence, when Jonny had practically melted against them for a moment before scowling and pulling away.

Seeing that the two others agreed with him, Marius pushed forward his next thought. Marius had always been the most touchy one of the Mechanisms, so it wasn’t really a surprise when he suggested: “Maybe it would, you know, if we, uhm, kind of, you know?”

“Spit it out, Von Raum.” that was Ashes.

“Pulledhimintoagrouphugtomakehimfeelbetter.” Marius said quickly, then he took a deep breath and repeated himself slower this time, “Pulled him into a group hug to make him feel better.”

“What?” Tim asked, ignoring the fact that he was already lying on top of Jonny embracing him.

Marius explained: “He’s been feeling bad for so long now and he usually doesn’t ask for this sort of thing, but contact is good for you, you can go weird if no one touches you for so long. This would be a perfect opportunity to do something nice for him and give him something he wants and needs. We can even tell him it was his idea since he probably won’t remember going here.”

“Something nice, you sound like Brian.” Tim grumbled, but he didn’t disagree and neither did Ashes. Instead the two did what Marius had suggested and started moving Jonny to a more comfortable position.

In the end Jonnys legs were thrown over Ashes lap as he curled up against Tims chest, who secured him in his arms, while Marius sat beside Tim to card him fingers through Jonnys hair.

They’d never seen Jonny so peaceful. He breathed softly and his face was lax, the lines that they’d thought were permanent had smoothed out. His entire body seemed to be boneless as he yielded to all the contact. There was even a small contend smile tugging at his lips.

He was, of course, still sick. They could feel the stickiness of sickness clinging to their First Mate and they all hoped Raphaella would find a cure soon, because it had been strange to see him so exhausted and unwell.

A silence hung over them, it was a comfortable silence that lasted for nearly an hour. 

Jonny had slept calmly during that time, but over the course of his sickness Jonny had already learned that calmness wouldn’t be permanent. He had tried to hide how much it sucked, but as Marius had predicted, he had forgotten he’d gone to the common area. 

So, when he woke up feeling terrible and needing to vomit, he did what he had done every time, and vomited over the side of the couch. He had put a bin next to his bed after the first three times it had happened and expected to find it next to him. 

He frowned when he didn’t see the bin there after he was done vomiting, he then also registered sounds behind him and hands holding him, which made the frown deepen.

When Jonny had suddenly surged up, he had startled the three others. He had forced his way out of Tims arms and almost fallen of the couch (which was much smaller than his bed) in the process of vomiting. Tim had quickly grabbed his waist to stop him from meeting the ground while he heaved and tried to throw up from an empty stomach. Ashes had also tightened their grip on Jonnys legs and Marius had leaned forward as he asked: “Jonny, are you alright? Do you need anything?”

Jonny noticed the hovering face of Marius first after he had gathered his bearings a bit. When he met eyes with the self proclaimed Doctor he gave him a confused look and hoarsely asked: “What the fuck are you doing in my room?”

“Uhm, you’re not in your room.” Marius replied.

That confused Jonny even more, but before he could think about it, Tim had decided that it wouldn’t be good to hang over the edge of the couch like that and hauled him back up.

The sudden movement disoriented Jonny a bit, so he just blinked owlishly up at Tim from where he was lying in his lap for a few seconds. When recognition dawned on him, he angrily slapped away the arms that were holding him and struggled upwards, only to come face to face with an amused Ashes, who smirked at him as they patted his leg lightly.

Jonny pulled his legs back to himself and just looked around with jerky movements and an angry and confused look on his face. After he had put together where he was he slowly stated: “What the fuck. Why am I here and why are you cuddling me!”

Marius had always been the best liar, so he quickly told Jonny the half truth he’d come up with: “Well, you came in here, looking exhausted and ill, and you asked for hugs, which we graciously provided, if I might add.”

Jonny had a to think about that for a moment. He vaguely recalled being cold and wanting a hug, but he couldn’t believe that he had allowed himself to ask for such a thing. He was always so good at keeping that need under the wraps and out of sight. Violence he could do, violence he could understand, but that soft need for comfort felt like a weakness he had to push down.

While he thought, he had unconsciously pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them close, looking more like a child than he probably would’ve wanted. 

When he didn’t say anything for a while, Tim spoke up, concern lacing his voice: “Jonny?” 

Jonny looked up. His cheeks had already been flushed with sickness, but the color was heightened with embarrassment. His mind felt cloudy and he couldn’t focus through the shame and sickness swirling around in his head. He hoped the others wouldn’t be mad at him, an irrational fear that needed soothing and made him swallow and mumble: “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ask.”

“Hey, don’t worry, it’s okay.” Tim said, when he heard the small tone that didn’t fit their boisterous First Mate at all. He gently put his hand on Jonnys shoulder and guided him back to his chest, where he’d laid before. Rubbing Jonnys back again, he went on: “We don’t mind at all, it’s nothing to be ashamed off. Everyone needs a hug every now and again.”

The figure in his arms was still tense and seemed ready to bolt at any time, but as Tim continued his ministrations along with Ashes who’d put a hand on Jonnys knee, he relaxed bit by bit until he was back in his earlier position, draped over Tim and Ashes. 

“Are you sure it’s alright?” Jonny asked, clearly still out of it, and only fully relaxed when Tim assured him again.

Marius, who had gotten up to clean the vomit of the ground and get something to wipe Jonnys face, returned at that point. He first cleaned the ground and put an empty bucket there, just in case. Then he sat down on to the small space left next to Jonny on the couch between Tim and Ashes. 

Jonny turned his head around at the sudden presence there and Marius smiled at him as he gently took Jonnys chin in one hand as he wiped the last traces of vomit off Jonnys face. Jonny tried to wiggle away and looked very displeased at the onslaught from the cloth on his face, which made Marius chuckle. That earned him a glare, but he was soon forgiven after he showed Jonny the glass of water he had brought with him to get the vile taste out of his mouth.

Making grabby hands at the glass, Jonny frowned again when Marius shook his head. The Doctor (not a Doctor, von Raum) said: “You can’t drink while lying down, Jonny.”

Jonny huffed, but allowed Tim to help him get to an upright position. Marius held the glass to his mouth and Jonny pouted: “I’m not a kid, I can drink on my own.”, it came out as barely a whisper, the coughing and vomiting had clearly done a number on his throat. 

“We know that.” Ashes said, they had never liked it when Smooth Mickey had treated them as a kid and could relate to how Jonny felt, but they could also see that Jonny would drop the glass right now, since he was too tired to even hold himself up, instead leaning heavily against Tim, so they went on: “But this isn’t about that. This is about you feeling shit and just needing to accept that you need a bit of help. Now, let Marius help you.”

They held a short staring match that was easily won by Ashes, since Jonnys eyes started to droop with sleep. He admitted defeat and slowly sipped from the glass Marius held to his lips, secretly happy with the care and attention.

When the glass was empty, Jonny slid down again until he was lying in Tims lap. He was embarrassed by the position, but also too exhausted and feeling too shitty to care right now. Maybe he would threaten all three of them later, if they ever made fun of him, but that sounded like too much work right now.

His stomach made a weird noise and it hurt. Jonny tried to curl into himself, but with Tim and Ashes holding his feet and upper body and Marius blocking the space at his side, he didn’t succeed. However, they did notice and Tim asked: “What’s wrong?”

Deciding that he had already done too much and felt too uncomfortable to be embarrassed about this, he whined: “Hurts.”

“What hurts?” Tim asked again.

“Tummy.” 

And wasn’t that just precious? The three thought as they silently fawned a bit.

Marius started rubbing Jonny stomach in the hope to alleviate the pain somewhat and it seemed to work. Jonny leaned into the touch and the frown that had appeared with the pain smoothed out again with a soft sigh.

After that he fell back into a fitful sleep from which he woke a few times. Each time the three of them would be there to comfort him until he drifted off once more.

In the end it was Tim, who decided that he needed a proper bed. Jonnys own room stank of sickness and Marius had the biggest bed, so they ended up in that one. All of them had gotten too attached to sleepy, cuddly, sick Jonny to leave him alone at that point.

Two days later Raphaella had found something that should help. Jonny was fed the vile concoction by Tim and when he came to he was free of the general yucky-ness of sickness and no longer confined to a bed.

He was also lucid enough to be embarrassed again and he had fled the scene, shooting the others with Tims gun before hiding in his own room. He had only come out after the three of them collectively promised not to mention it to the others at all.

Jonny had opened the door, still in his oversized sleep shirt with red cheeks and threatened them all once more. Then he gave Tim his gun back and turned away to take a nice long hot shower. Before he closed the door, however, he softly said: “Uhm, thank- thank you.”

He did throw the door close with a loud bang after that, leaving the others to share a grin amongst themselves. 

They did keep their promise, but that didn’t stop them from being overprotective off him after the whole thing. Being more lenient with his bullshit and hugging him more often. Jonny was not all that amused and always grumbled about it, but he couldn’t stop the small smile each time it happened, which was enough for the others to keep going.

In the end they even got Brian involved, without mentioning it, although they did point out how cute and tiny Jonny was, and the Toy Soldier also jumped on the Hug-Jonny-More bandwagon, since it was always happy to be involved.

When Jonny noticed he told all of them that this was the reason Nastya was his favourite, which was partially true (there were more reasons, like shared trauma and just being so long in each others vicinity), but he couldn’t help it if the others gained a warmer spot in his metal heart.

These idiots were all so old that the small difference in age hardly mattered, but Jonny was their little shit and they loved him as he loved them. They couldn’t help it, they were family after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, I just wanted Jonny to get a hug, but we all know he wouldn't accepted it, so I made him sick so that he could have hug, as a treat.
> 
> Also yolo space sickness means I don't have to do research and make shit up as it fits me!
> 
> (All the ages are based on headcanons)
> 
> Kudos and Comments make me feel like I am just as immortal as this space crew, so thank you for leaving them!!


End file.
